CF Naming Conventions

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CF_Naming_Conventions Description: [[TermDesc::CF Metadata Conventions support interoperability of Earth Science data. A central element of the CF Conventions is the Standard Name Table, which uniquely associates each standard name with a geophysical parameter, named according to the CF Naming Guidelines. These can be used to find or compare datasets in catalog browsers such as AQ_uFIND. As of 2010, there are 680 CF-registered Atmospheric Chemistry names, covering mostly model-generated parameters. The naming of observation-parameters is poorly covered.]]

Glossary Domain: WCS, HTAP

Related Links

Links to this page
[[Links::CF Conventions, Standardized Geographic Region Names

• CF Conventions]]

Contributors

[[Contributors::Christiane Textor with CFpeople.]]

History

[[History::The naming activity was initiated in 2006 and coordinated by ChristianeTextor. An ad hoc virtual workgroup constructed and discussed the new CF standard_names for air chemistry and aerosols using a wiki workspace. The names were submitted to the CF Community for approval and added the CF Names table in 2008. The extension of standards names list to include observational and other atmospheric chemistry parameters awaits new community initiatives.]]

Term Details

List of Chemical Species and Aerosols

The list of chemical species and aerosols, (as of October 29 2008) contains over 100 entries, in alphabetical order. The question mark indicates a modification of existing CF standard names is suggested for these species. There is a strong need to further discuss and refine the chemical/aerosol naming conventions.

CF Naming Procedure

New standard_names are defined through a step-wise procedure, see the CF conventions web site. Many new proposals for standard names for aerosols and chemicals are under discussion at the CF mailing list. This requires the development of a general approach on how to proceed. See Construction of Atmospheric Chemistry and Aerosol Terms for further discussion.

CF Naming Example

An example CF standard name for Atmospheric Chemistry extracted from the CF Standard Name Table

standard_name: mass_concentration_of_ammonium_dry_aerosol_in_air
long_name: Mass concentration means mass per unit volume and is used in the construction mass_concentration_of_X_in_Y, where X is a material constituent of Y. A chemical species denoted by X may be described by a single term such as 'nitrogen' or a phrase such as 'nox_expressed_as_nitrogen'. "Aerosol" means the suspended liquid or solid particles in air (except cloud droplets). Aerosol takes up ambient water (a process known as hygroscopic growth) depending on the relative humidity and the composition of the aerosol. "Dry aerosol" means aerosol without water. The chemical formula for ammonium is NH4.
unit: kg m-3

Projects/Programs Using CF Chemistry Names

The CF convention for naming atmospheric chemicals and aerosols has been adopted by the following model intercomparisons (state of July 2008):

• Task Force on Hemispheric Transport of Air Pollution (TF HTAP)
• SPARC Chemistry-Climate Model Validation Activity (CCMVal)
• IGAC-SPARC Atmospheric Chemistry & Climate Initiative (AC&C)
• Aerosol Comparisons between Observations and Models (AeroCOM)

The CF naming conventions are also being adopted by the Global Observing System of Systems (GEOSS), GEO Task DA-09-02-d: Atmospheric Model Evaluation Network for the application of Earth observations from distributed archives using standardized approaches to evaluate and improve model performance. See aslo GEO Air Quality Community of Practice AQ CoP for further details.

Software Applications Using CF Names

• uFIND for finding data access web services in the HTAP Network
• uFIND for finding data access web services registered in the GEOSS Clearinghouse